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Notes of interest... |
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From time to time, I like to post interesting ideas for my readers.
In recent months, SC Engineering visited the Lamar Wind Farm
and the Denver Regional Transportation District Light-rail maintenance facility in Denver.
Click on the following links, and take a look.
- Martin
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Lamar Wind Farm in Lamar, Colorado
Early this spring, I toured the Lamar wind farm in Colorado. The wind turbines in this farm are
GE 1.5MW machines. Across the country wind energy is continuing to
grow as a viable renewable energy source, although there are problems with bird strikes
and other matters, which hopefully can be addressed and mitigated.
Burgeoning Wind Power - the early days. Looking at these new machines it got me thinking about the good ol' days back in the 1980's when I worked as an engineer and project manager for Rockwell International and the Solar Energy Research Institute out at Rocky Flats near Boulder. At that time we were concerned with blade fatigue, vibration, conversion efficiency, and novel ideas. So, I thought I would post a few pictures of a bye-gone era that gave birth to today's modern contraptions. Take a look... |
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Yours truly, inspecting a wood / fiberglass composite experimental wind turbine blade
being built by a boat building company in Bay City, Michigan. These composite blades
provided good strength and flexibility.
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Kaman 40kW at Rocky Flats anticipating high winds through the Flat-Irons notch.
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McDonnell Douglas Giromil 40kW, and the Alcoa Darius 40kW at Rocky Flats.
The Kaman had variable pitch blades, but the Giromil - now that was novel. Three vertical
blades rotated about their centers to maintain angle of attack.
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A colleaugue performing a vibration impact test of a Jay Carter blade. We were using
an early computer code called MAP (Modal Analysis Program) to automate impact trials
and animate eigen vector modes. Understanding vibration modes helped us validate computer
models of blade dynamics and better predict fatigue life.
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Measuring tower shadow impulse profile using hot-wire anemometry
to better understand dynamic stall from variations in blade airfoil geometry.
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Small wind turbine under controlled velocity testing at the Federal Transportation Technology
Center. Look closely for the wind turbine
mounted on the flatbed car. We pushed the turbine on this flatbed to produce controlled
wind conditions from which we precisely measured machine performance.
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The Federal Wind Energy Technology Center at Rocky Flats near Boulder, Colorado as it appeared in 1983
under management of Rockwell International. With offices also downtown Boulder, the program at one
time had over 100 staff members. Before construction of the passive solar building you see in the
picture, engineers at the site were housed in trailers encased with wire fencing to prevent injury from
accidental
impact caused by a flying broken blade. In those days, rotor speed of small (< 10kw) machines
could be very high and stresses over time could lead to broken blades.
It gave a whole new meaning to the words, "duck and cover" or "incoming!"
Those were the days... Cheers, Martin |